


Sweater

by TheSushiMonster



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-27
Updated: 2014-04-27
Packaged: 2018-01-21 00:24:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1531157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheSushiMonster/pseuds/TheSushiMonster
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"The first time she kisses him after, Fitz almost gags in her mouth.” Fitz no longer sees Skye as she was.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Sweater

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CRIMSONBRUXA](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CRIMSONBRUXA/gifts).



> HAPPY BIRTHDAY TIFF! For the prompt Fitzskye + broken strings/”let me hold you for the last time”

The first time she kisses him after, Fitz almost gags in her mouth.

He doesn’t though, instead stiffening under her caress, willing the poison in her breath to miss him completely. Even when she pulls him closer, hand grasped tightly against his tie, Fitz digs his fingers into her back with the intent to erase scars.

But all he sees is the blood-stained death certificate.

 

Skye knows he’s pulling away, bit by bit, and everything eats her from the inside out. She wants to scream - at Fitz, at Coulson, at _fucking Ward_ \- but usually before she can, her heart rips into pieces that each ache to be whole again.

“He’ll understand,” Coulson had said, looking anywhere but at her. He sees her wrists covered in red and blood in her teeth and death in her hair. To Coulson, Skye is no longer the innocent project to fix. Now, she saves worlds by killing their own.

“I don’t think he will,” she had said, because this is Fitz, with gold heart and red smile, with precise courage and willful brilliance. “This is Fitz.”

Coulson says nothing and Skye leaves with secrets buried between her teeth.

 

Whenever she touches him, Fitz feels his skin peeling away, her acidic caresses slowly suffocating him. One time, when she reaches for his arm, her fingers sting against his skin and pulls back. “Sorry,” she says.

He doesn’t believe her. He can’t believe much of what she says anymore. “I don’t think I can - “

“I get it,” says Skye with a sad smile. She massages her knees and doesn’t look at him and that’s probably a good thing. Fitz sees only red and black when he looks at her. “I - I didn’t want to, if that helps.”

Fitz sees the man biting back a smile and slapping him on the back and stepping forward when others can’t. “It doesn’t,” he says before leaving the room.

 

Fitz is the one who finds them.

The gun shakes in her hands, the echo of the gunshot still vibrating in her ears and through her bones. But Ward lies slumped and bloodied on the ground and Fitz finds them like that, dead Ward and gun-wielding Skye.

“Skye?” Fitz doesn’t move towards her but he doesn’t back away. It’s the last time he doesn’t back away. “What’s going on?”

“I had to - he was - “ Words crowd her mouth but her brain struggles to catch up and all that leaves her lips is probably nonsense. “I’m sorry - I had to - he - “

Without comment, Fitz gathers her in his arms. The gun clatters to the floor and Skye cries into his sweater.

 

Fitz tells Jemma he wants to transfer the day after he leaves Skye alone. Her eyes still haunt him, dull and brown and cold. They follow him, goosebumps lining his arm, until all he thinks of is her. Fitz thinks of Skye in before and after, and while the past remains tinged in nostalgic fantasies, the future is tainted by bullet holes.

“Are you sure - “ says Jemma, glancing at the empty doorway. “I know you and Skye - “

“I need to leave,” says Fitz, shoulders stiff. “If you want to come too, I won’t complain. But if you want to stay - “ and when she glances downwards, he knows her answer. “I don’t blame you.”

So Jemma smiles and Fitz files a transfer order with Coulson and Skye finds him in his bunk packing a week later.

 

“You’re leaving.” She’d wanted to lead with something better, something wittier, something familiar and warm and them. But Fitz continues to surprise her with hard glances and quick reflexes. Skye grimaces at her lame opening but when she looks back at him, the intensity of his gaze leaves her breathless.

Fitz shuts the door and pushes her up against it. His breath is warm, just like his chest against her heart. Her hands tangle around his neck and her fingers begin the familiar dance of running through his curls. And when she licks her lips, he captures her tongue with a kiss and breathing seems unnecessary with his hands running down her sides.

He still tastes of iron and vanilla and he still sets her on fire from the heart down. His sweater burns against her palms as she runs her hands up his chest. But the roughness in this kiss isn’t from passion. The tear that falls is involuntary and makes him taste like salt too. Pulling back slightly, she tries to kiss down his jaw, but he quickly repositions her head with his hands, keeping their lips together. The second tear escapes her throat and Fitz swallows it.

When he pulls back, Skye wants to heave - he looks her straight in the eye before wiping his lips with the back of his hand.

Skye doesn’t say anything when Fitz turns away, but she wants to. She wants to scream, to yell. She hopes that he heard her whispers in their kiss, her attempt at spilling the truth - _he was HYDRA, I had to, I can’t tell you_ \- but the complete silence that hovers between them is thick and heavy and settles in a suffocating embrace as Fitz zips up his bag.

“Yeah, I’m leaving,” he says finally. He doesn’t look at her, merely waits for her to step aside, before opening the door and walking out.

Skye blinks several times, holding herself together with her own arms, and when Jemma looks for her an hours later, she finds Skye still standing in Fitz’s room with blank eyes and lies between her teeth.


End file.
